Settlers Burn Vehicles Near Qalqilya as Israeli Forces Raid West Bank Villages

Across the occupied West Bank on Saturday, settlers carried out attacks against residents and property while Israeli occupation forces conducted raids that included injuries, including a young man with special needs.

Local sources said settlers attacked the village of Jit, east of Qalqilya in the northern West Bank, setting fire to four vehicles and agricultural lands and attempting to burn homes, while Hassan Milihat of the Bedir Rights Organization said the blaze was near the treatment plant on the Deir Sharaf–Tulkarm road.

Al-Jarida al-Quds

The Palestinian Red Crescent reported that in Douma, south of Nablus in the northern West Bank, a 29-year-old man was shot by occupation forces and that medics were prevented from treating him before coordinating to reach him, with the man described as disabled.

In Bethlehem, Red Crescent teams treated 30 cases of suffocation from tear gas following the occupation forces’ raid on the Dheisheh camp, and a girl was transported to the hospital while remaining cases were treated on-site.

In parallel, the Arabic-language report said settlers stole water pipes from the Khalayl al-Luz area southeast of Bethlehem and attacked workers at the Jerusalem Electricity Company in Wadi Rahal south of Bethlehem, injuring several with minor wounds and causing substantial damage to their vehicle.

WAFA, via the Palestinian News and Information Agency, said the Commission in charge of prisoners' affairs and ex-prisoners and the Palestinian Prisoners Club highlighted an escalation in arrest campaigns against Palestinian civilians whose identification indicates they originate from Gaza, including women.

The press release described the most recent case as a cancer patient arrested at a checkpoint while on her way to Jerusalem to receive treatment, and it said the occupation targets citizens who originate from Gaza but have lived for years in the occupied West Bank.

Al-Jazeera Net

The Commission and the Club issued a special appeal to citizens whose identity indicates they are Gaza residents living in the West Bank to exercise caution, especially in light of the recent expulsion of journalist Saeqal Qadom toward Gaza.

The same WAFA-linked account said that since the aggression and ongoing genocide against Gaza, occupying forces have carried out wide arrest campaigns in the West Bank targeting Gaza workers who moved to the West Bank after October 7.

It further stated that the occupation still today prohibits legal teams and the International Committee of the Red Cross from visiting Gaza detainees, or disclosing information about their fate or place of detention.

In a nighttime raid timestamped around 10 p.m. Saturday, security-camera footage obtained by the Associated Press showed dozens of settlers storming the small Bedouin hamlet of Khirbet al-Sidra north of Jerusalem, with gunshots, screams, and barking dogs audible as buildings burned.

“Israeli settlers escalated their attacks today, Saturday, against the residents of Palestinian villages, setting fire to agricultural lands and vehicles in various areas of the West Bank, in tandem with the Israeli army's raid on several towns there”

Al-Jazeera Net

The Jerusalem Governorate of the Palestinian Authority said eight houses and at least two cars were set on fire during the attack, while the Israeli army said troops dispatched to the scene found an Israeli vehicle containing batons and that Palestinians, Israelis, and foreign nationals were wounded.

By Sunday afternoon, the report said no arrests had been reported, and it described the raid as part of a pattern in a tense territory where settler violence has surged in recent months.

Separately, the La Presse report said an Israeli minister ordered the cutoff of water and electricity to UNRWA facilities, and it quoted the UN agency on X as saying the cut could take effect within two weeks.

The same article said UNRWA provides aid and services—particularly in health and education—to about 2.5 million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem, and that Israel had barred the agency from operating on its territory earlier last year.